“Not quite that much! But enough to make you rich for life—IF you had it.”
The old woman turned away pathetically and shook her gray head.
“I wouldn't have to work no more, would I?”
Her thin hands touched the faded, dirty dress.
“And I could buy me a decent dress,” her voice sank to a whisper, “and I could find my boy.”
“You bet you could!” Jim exclaimed. “There's just one god in this world now, old girl—the Almighty Dollar!”
He paused and leaned close, persuasively:
“Suppose now, the man that got that money had to kill a fool to take it—what of it? You don't get big money any other way. A burglar watches his chance, takes his life in his hands and drills his way into a house. He finds a fool there who fights. It's not his fault that the man was born a fool, now is it?”
“Mebbe not——”
“Of course not. A burglar kills but one to get his pile, and then only because he must, in self-defence. A big gambling capitalist corners wheat, raises the price of bread and starves a hundred thousand children to death to make his. It's not stained with blood. Every dollar is soaked in it! Who cares?”